Long weekend at Mallipo Beach.

Monday was a school holiday in South Korea this week, so with our long weekend Jeremy and I decided to go on a trip. We chose to go to Mallipo Beach which is in the Taean Coast National Marine Park on the West coast of the country.
When we got up on Saturday it was pissing rain here in Miho and the forecast for the area we were headed called for rain all weekend. We have yet to buy any rain gear despite the oncoming rainy season, so we debated about whether or not it was worth going to the beach if it was going to be raining. Finally the decision was that if we are from the West coast of BC then we are pretty pathetic if we can't handle some ocean rain and we packed some warmer clothes then we originally intended and headed out the door.
What a beautiful place!
The town itself leaves something to be desired, but at least it was unlike any place we had ever been. Along the water is a street lined with seafood restaurants on one side. They eat all the seafood that we don't in Canada, so the tanks to showcase the possible meals were filled with crazy shaped shells, eels, sea cucumbers, rays, weird looking rock fish and flat bottom fish with their faces sideways and skewed. We didn't end up eating any of it, however, because Jeremy isn't the hugest fan of seafood and after we had a bad experience at our first restaurant with just feeling unwanted, we decided to save some money and have some fun and cooked the remainder of our meals in our room. Besides the bustling main street, the town had a kind of deserted ghost-town feel to it. There were lots of empty lots and abandoned buildings with hotels scattered randomly throughout. To add to the ghost-town feel was a small amusement park that was mostly abandoned and broken down. One ride was still running and that was a huge swinging boat that amounted in lots of screams from the few people who rode on it. Even that ride was looking rough though, it's sign that once said "Viking" now had "Viki" lit up in fading red lights. During the day it was all quite amusing, but Jer and I went to check it out at night and it gave me the creeps.
It turns out that there was an oil spill in the area in 2007 and we assume that this is the cause of this state of abandonment in Mallipo. They had pictures of the cleanup. There were so many people there working together to clean up the spill. It made me cry, of course, and Jeremy commented that it is clear that BP was not in charge of this one. Way to go Korea on getting it done so fast and so well!!!
Mallipo beach is really beautiful and because we were there on a semi-rainy weekend and not during peak season, it was not very crowded either. It's over 3km of sand with great rocky areas at either end. There are also some cool pine forests to walk through. The pine trees here are really cool. All the needles point upwards and the branches start high up, making them distinctly Asian compared to what I'm used to. The tide there goes out really far and the beach opens up and feels almost as wide as it is long. When the tide was really far out Jeremy and I walked along the rocks that were exposed and saw some really great rock cliffs with layers upon layers of pink, white and all shades of beige rock. The tidal pools didn't have much life to poke at, but they had plant life that was the most amazing pastel turquoise and lavender. Finally Saturday evening it rained as was promised and we strolled along the beach getting soaked head to toe.
That night Jeremy and I passed out early from a day of traveling and exploring only to be woken up by the distinct sound of the shouts of the Reds!!! Thank goodness the soccer fans are so loud or we would have missed the game. We sprung out bed after missing the first 10 minutes of the soccer game and the first goal against South Korea. The rest of the game was really fun to watch. South Korea dominated the play. They played like the deserved to move on to the top 8, but, unfortunately, they didn't score like the deserved it. I'm not sure if it is better to lose playing the best you could and knowing you were the better team or to lose to a team that outplayed you. Whatever way is the easier way to lose, it was pretty sad to watch Uruguay jumping up and down celebrating a win that they didn't deserve. So much for that soccer season.
Sunday started off cold and shrouded in mist so dense that you couldn't see the other end of the beach. Jeremy and I walked out to an island that was connected to the mainland during low tide. It was really cool and we got to watch people diving for shellfish and listen to them calling to each other across the still sea, their voices echoing against the rocks. When we walked back off the island the tide was moving in faster then we had anticipated and what had been a large bridge of land connecting island to beach was then a thin strip of jagged rocks. We were lucky to have not decided to stay another half hour or so on the island because when we watched fishermen coming back to shore after us, they had to struggle pretty badly to make the gap.
We sat and watched the mist lift and as the sun poked through the clouds the air became instantly hot and what was supposed to be a rainy Sunday turned into a sunny, beautiful day. We spent the better part of the afternoon lounging in the sun, reading, playing frisbee, wading in the ice cold water. By dinner time most of the tourists had headed home and by sunset the beach was almost empty. As the night grew dark the virtually empty streets of Mallipo really did feel like a ghost-town.

I'll post pictures when I get around to going through them. Right now, however, I have to do my homework.

The shouts of the reds!

The big news of today is that last night, well at 3:oo this morning, South Korea played Nigeria in their last game of round-robin at the World Cup. Jeremy wanted to get up and watch it, but I informed him that because we don't even actually like soccer, that was going too far. So we looked up the highlights when we woke up this morning. The game was a draw 2-2, but SOUTH KOREA IS MOVING ON! We (I like being the "we" fans of sports) are moving on to play Uruguay in the next round. They play Saturday and I am very excited! The country of South Korea is completely mad with soccer fever and I am more than happy to be a part of that. We will probably go downtown to watch the game. Some new friends have promised to take us out if we made it to the next round.

The Red Devils (Korean soccer fans) take this very seriously!


This is the official song of the World Cup... hard to imagine I'm already sick of it! Go Korea Go!!!

Here it goes!

Eva suggested that instead of writing emails I start writing them in blog form. This is a good idea for a bunch of reasons. The first is that I can easily attach pictures and, as Eva so cheekily said, that will save me a thousand words with each one. The second is that more people can read my blog; whoever wants to keep updated on me can and whoever doesn't can just not read it and I won't be offended.

So here it is, a blog of my time in Korea.